Subject: Linux-Misc Digest #809
From: Digestifier <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 23 Sep 94 18:13:52 EDT

Linux-Misc Digest #809, Volume #2                Fri, 23 Sep 94 18:13:52 EDT

Contents:
  Re: More Memory = Slow Linux?? (Ian McCloghrie)
  Re: Do HP SCSI DAT drives work? (Michael Dreher)
  Licenced WordPerfect 5.1 runs only after the DEMO Version (Christian Kranz)
  Re: How to use a host as a router - READ THIS (Jay Ashworth)
  Re: which is better: Mitsumi or Panasonic CDROM? (David Barr)
  Re: P5-90 MHz beats SGI R4000-100MHz. (Ove Ewerlid)
  Re: Damn X-aware xterms!!! (Daniel Poirot)
  Re: More Memory = Slow Linux?? (Tom Barringer)
  Seeking modem advice, experiences (James H. Haynes)
  Errors writing to MSDOS Partition (Bernhard Kappler)
  Re: P5-90 MHz beats SGI R4000-100MHz. (Ian McCloghrie)
  AVI/QT programs? (Bob)
  Re: Don't use Linux or it's to academic! (Dan Newcombe)
  Re: Licenced WordPerfect 5.1 runs only after the DEMO Version (Mark A. Davis)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Ian McCloghrie)
Subject: Re: More Memory = Slow Linux??
Date: 23 Sep 1994 10:10:14 -0700

[email-masked] (Huw Leonard) writes:

>In article <ianm.780262652@miles> [email-masked] (Ian McCloghrie) writes:
>>only got 24 address lines on an ISA bus, so it's a pretty fundamental
>>limitation.  With PCI, EISA, or (presumably) MCA, you can get around
>>this.

>And, BTW, VL-bus. Other 32-bit OS deal with it by making the >16MB memory into 
>non-DMA cache space. Anyone know if that's what Linux does?

Ummm... I believe that VLB does not provide its own DMA hardware,
but uses that which is on the ISA bus instead.  Thus it doesn't fix
the > 16M problem.

From what I've read on the net, Linux uses bounce buffers, DMAing into
kernel space < 16M and then copying to the real location, > 16M if
necessary.

--
____
\bi/  Ian McCloghrie      | FLUG:  FurryMUCK Linux User's Group
 \/   email: [email-masked] | Card Carrying Member, UCSD Secret Islandia Club
GCS (!)d-(--) p c++ l++(+++) u+ e- m+ s+/+ n+(-) h- f+ !g w+ t+ r y*

The above represents my personal opinions and not necessarily those
of my employer, Qualcomm Inc.

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Michael Dreher)
Date: Wed, 21 Sep 1994 13:58:14 GMT
Subject: Re: Do HP SCSI DAT drives work?

Richard Giles ([email-masked]) wrote:
: Anybody know if HP SCSI DAT drives work on Linux. We have an Adaptec SCSI
: card which is already working with a 1 Gig. hard disc.

My HP DAT drive works fine with linux and the NCR 53c810 hostadapter. 

: Also, can you have multiple backups on the 1 tape.

It's possible, but you must use the nonrewinding device /dev/nrmt0 and find
the right place on the tape 'by hand' (using 'mt fsf <n>'). I never tried
it, but it should work. You can also try to use the add-mode of tar, but
there is a good chance, that this doesn't work.

 cu, Michael

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Christian Kranz)
Subject: Licenced WordPerfect 5.1 runs only after the DEMO Version
Date: 23 Sep 1994 13:59:37 GMT

Hello,

I have installed a licenced version of WordPerfect 5.1 for SCO-Unix.

After starting it i get the following error message:
> xwp

X Error of failed request:  BadValue (integer parameter out of range for  
operation)
  Major opcode of failed request:  51 (X_SetFontPath)
  Minor opcode of failed request:  0
  Resource id in failed request:  0x4
  Serial number of failed request:  39
  Current serial number in output stream:  40

If i run it after the DEMO version of WordPerfect it works fine.

Any comments?

  Ch. Kranz ([email-masked])

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Jay Ashworth)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.development,comp.os.linux.admin,alt.uu.comp.os.linux.questions
Subject: Re: How to use a host as a router - READ THIS
Date: 23 Sep 1994 15:53:03 -0400

[email-masked] (David - Morris) writes:
>Re. why not 127.0.0.0 instead of 127.0.0.1 -- the destination address must
>be a 'host' address and the host address can't be zero (0).

True... but I think he was talking about the destination address, not the
interface address... you can route either the loopback _net_, or the
loopback _host_, with equal facility.

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth        High Technology Systems Comsulting             Ashworth
Designer              Linux: The Choice of a GNU Generation       & Associates
ka1fjx/4                                                  
[email-masked]   "Hey! Do any of you guys know how to Madison?"  813 790 7592

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (David Barr)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: Re: which is better: Mitsumi or Panasonic CDROM?
Date: 20 Sep 1994 16:04:13 GMT

[email-masked] (Jeff Tranter) writes:

>Apart from whether the hardware is better, currently under Linux the
>kernel drivers for the Panasonic seem to be better than for
>Mitsumi. The driver has been optimized for performance, up to 16
>drives can be connected, PhotoCD is supported, and you can read the
>digital data from audio CDs. It is also quite good at autoprobing for
>the drive i/o address.

Why can't the Mitsumi read digital data from audio CDs?  Is this a
limitation of the hardware, or the driver?

David
-- 
   /David Barr   (206)685-8129   University of Washington           /
  /Systems Programmer           Medical Centers Information Systems/
 /[email-masked]      Seattle, Washington, USA           /
/        http://alfred1.u.washington.edu:8080/~davidb/           /

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Ove Ewerlid)
Subject: Re: P5-90 MHz beats SGI R4000-100MHz.
Date: 23 Sep 1994 20:14:03 GMT

> Oh yeah? What about SGIs superb graphics ? What about the fact that you 
> can put 256MB RAM in them (and it works! (have you ever seen a PC 
> with > 64MB?)) ?
Yup!  Got one in front of me - 128 Mb.

> What about ECC checked memory ? What about a >200MB/sec bus ?
Yup! Got one in front of me that does more than 200Mb/sec (64 bits wide)

This is a vanilla P90 system!

However, the disk throughput suck as I only have one IDE drive on an
ISA bus. It is, however, not noticable due to the amount of DRAM available.

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Daniel Poirot)
Subject: Re: Damn X-aware xterms!!!
Date: 22 Sep 1994 17:58:08 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Alex Ramos <[email-masked]> wrote:
>Yeah I know an xterm is "X-aware" by definition... but maybe someone
>knows what I'm talking about: On slackware2.0 Linux, it's impossible
>to paste between xterms, because whenever you click on one, it emulates
>arrow keys instead of highlighting for pasting. How do I disable such
>an annoying (argghh) "feature"?

BIZZZT  Sorry, wrong, thanks for playing...

Actually, the problem is with /usr/bin/elvis.  It thinks that you mean
to move the point when you click...

I removed the link from /usr/bin/vi to /usr/bin/elvis and linked
it instead to /usr/bin/vim.
-- 
Daniel Poirot           [email-masked]
NASA JSC                "The mind is a terrible thing."
ER3                     tel: (713)483-8793
Houston, TX 77058       fax: (713)483-3204

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Tom Barringer)
Subject: Re: More Memory = Slow Linux??
Date: 22 Sep 1994 20:09:48 GMT
Reply-To: [email-masked]

|> |> I keep seeing posts made by people who have added memory
|> |> to their computers and subsequently experienced a drop in
|> |> performance under Linux.
|> |> 
|> |> I want to know if anyone knows *why* this happens.  Please post
|> |> any replies to this newsgroup, since I believe others would also
|> |> be interested in hearing the answers.  If you cannot post for
|> |> whatever reason, e-mail me (I will forward to the newsgroup if
|> |> you like).
|> 
|> OK.  here is the scoop:
|> 
|> Most PC motherboards have really cheesy cache setups.  The cache works
|> fine as long as you don't put too much RAM in.  When you get too much
|> RAM, the cache does not work on the upper part, so on a 16 Meg system,
|> you may only have caching on the lower 8 Meg.  If your cache RAM is 15ns
|> and your DRAM is 70ns, and your cache hit rate is 90% for the lower 8 Meg
|> and 0% for the upper 8 Meg, then your AVERAGE time for memory access is:
|> 
|> lower 8 Meg: .10 * 70 + .9 * 15 = 20.5 ns
|> upper 8 Meg: 1.0 * 70 + 0.0* 15 = 70 ns
|> overall:                          45.25 ns   
|> 
|> So, by adding the upper 8 Meg, you have more than doubled the AVERAGE time
|> to access memory.  The cache makes a big difference.
|> 
|> The fix:  upgrade your cache to 256K.  Don't forget to upgrade the
|> cache tag RAM as well, or you will still get no benefit from the 
|> additional cache.  Some motherboards are so cheesy that it is
|> impossible to cache the whole address space, even with the maximum
|> cache RAM.

To add the final nail to the coffin:
Since the cacheing works from 0000 up, and DOS conventional memory
is all in the lowest area, you don't ordinarily see the slowdown.
It's only when you're USING that higher memory that the lack of cacheing
gets you... like a UNIX-type OS does.  If you use that new-and-uncached 
memory in Windows you'll see it slow down too, when your system resources 
start getting used up that high.  (But even uncached it still looks faster 
than it used to with 8M because you are using real memory 
for the 8-16M area instead of disk swap space.  Changing the cacheing
appropriately results in a _further_ speedup over just installing the
extra memory.)

The point being, DOS and Windows don't use that memory often or well --
which is why they don't get the same benefit from it that Linux does.

--
Tom Barringer      : Progress Software Corp.   : The Tall Conspiracy is looking
QA Development     : 14 Oak Park               : for members.  Please see the
[email-masked]  : Bedford, MA  01730        : recruitment flyer posted on
GEnie: T.Barringer : #include <std/disclaim.i> : the top of your refrigerator.
HREF="ftp://ftp.progress.com/tomb/tomb.html"

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (James H. Haynes)
Subject: Seeking modem advice, experiences
Date: 22 Sep 1994 17:59:14 GMT

Last night I noticed there are internal 14.4K modems selling as low as $75,
and 28.8K modems selling as low as $120.  And a bewildering variety of
modems selling at a variety of prices.  Can we collect some data on which
ones do or don't work well with Linux?
-- 
[email-masked]

"Ya can talk all ya wanna, but it's dif'rent than it was!"
"No it aint!  But ya gotta know the territory!"
        Meredith Willson: "The Music Man"

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Bernhard Kappler)
Subject: Errors writing to MSDOS Partition
Date: 20 Sep 94 07:43:37 GMT

Hello,

I'm running Linux on a 386-33Mhz with 8 MB memory. I've an Adaptec
1542 SCSI Board and a 80MB Disk from SeaGate and a 660MB Disk from HP.
Linux works fine with the ext2 filesystem. Only writing on a msdos
partition almost ever leads to corrupt files. This happens only if
I write a file on my msdos Partion on the harddisk. Floppies do fine.

I found out that files get corrupted doing a "sync" or waiting until
the buffer has been copied to disk.

For example:

        cp file /msdos/file
        diff file /msdos/file

        no differences will be found until the buffer has been flushed 
        to disk.

Doing:  cp file /msdos/file
        sync
        diff file /msdos/file

        will show up differences in over 90% of the tries!!!!

My dos partition uses to second half of the HP disk (the upper cylinders).
I think the disk has about 1400 Cylinders, put I actualy don't know.
The partition was created using fdisk from linux and FAT 16 BIT as 
filesystem.

I hope someone can help me to fix this problem!!!

Bernhard Kappler      [email-masked]

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Ian McCloghrie)
Subject: Re: P5-90 MHz beats SGI R4000-100MHz.
Date: 23 Sep 1994 10:17:33 -0700

[email-masked] (Valery Petrov) writes:

>the price difference (similarly equipped SGI is ~3 times more expensive)
>I wonder who whould like to buy those Indigos nowdays. 

(in the future, please try to use lines < 70 characters long)

The reason people buy Indigos (and SGIs in general) is not to have
general CPU compute servers.  The reason, quite simply, is graphics.
(Yup, that's what the 'G' in SGI stands for).  The amount of graphics
rendering hardware one can get in an SGI is more than just about any
other off-the-shelf workstation, certainly more than in a PC.
Combine this with their GL 3-d graphics libraries, and you've got a
system for doing really really nice graphics programming.

--
____
\bi/  Ian McCloghrie      | FLUG:  FurryMUCK Linux User's Group
 \/   email: [email-masked] | Card Carrying Member, UCSD Secret Islandia Club
GCS (!)d-(--) p c++ l++(+++) u+ e- m+ s+/+ n+(-) h- f+ !g w+ t+ r y*

The above represents my personal opinions and not necessarily those
of my employer, Qualcomm Inc.

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Bob)
Subject: AVI/QT programs?
Date: 21 Sep 1994 22:01:40 GMT

i read somewhere that there are AVI and Quicktime viewers for Xwindows.  have
any of them been ported to XFree?  if so, where are they?  if not, does anyone
know where any of the non-ported programs are located?

thanx,

bob
-- 
Bob Hollinger           <------------------------------------->
4B Chaucer Ln.          > \       [email-masked]       / <  Disclaimer:
Streamwood, IL  60107   >   \/\/     [email-masked]      \/\/   <
708-483-9391            <------------------------------------->I don't know her!

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Dan Newcombe)
Subject: Re: Don't use Linux or it's to academic!
Date: Fri, 23 Sep 1994 15:56:22 UNDEFINED

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Svein Erik Brostigen) writes:

><Flam-bait follows!>

Good...I'm hungry.

>1. There is no support for the more sofisticated disk handlings like
>   RAID 5 or STRIPING.

And I suppose there is under DOS?  Hey...if you really need it, write a device 
driver for it.

>2. There are no programs available that does Word-processing, spreadsheets,
>   databases, presentation graphics and so on, as we have under MS-DOS
>   and Windows.

Hmmm....remind me when I get home to check and see what this Andrew Word 
Processors is that's taking up hard drive space, or sc, or ingres, or 
postgres, or SCO Oracle, or ...

Yes, MS-Word doesn't run under Linux (yet), but there is more to life than 
Bill Gates.

>3. There is currently no easy way to interconnect to LAN Server or Netware
>   natively, i.e.  from Linux.

This I am not sure about...but isn't there IPX support in the kernel?  Or is 
it still rough?  Plus, I think you can connect to a Netware server under 
DOSEMU.

>4. There is no support for MCA-based machines.

It's not my fault if you bought proprietary and bad hardware from IBM.  
Gee...I doubt there is a ReelMagic MCA card either...guess that means it sucks 
too.

>5. There is no support for Token-Ring (some ALPHA code is floating around
>   on the Net, but....)

There is also no support for light pens.   Hey...if you want the support, 
write it or help contribute...but obviously Token Ring hasn't been in much 
demand.  I guess this goes back to that buying IBM stuff again :)

>6. Nationalized version of the few programs existing are not available.
>7. Nationalized versions of Linux is not available.

I think you said it best at the start of your message:
        "Norwegian is my first language, English my second"

>8. Support for modern graphics accelerators like Mach64, Stealth64 etc, 
>   is not scheduled until maybe next year.

Yeah...so.  They're scheduled aren't they.  If you want them right away, call 
Diamond and ATI and bitch at them until the supply native drivers when the 
release the cards.

>9. Printed manuals and easy 'Get started' manuals does not exist.

Bull shit.  That is a laugh.

>10. Support for Mulit-media is shaky.

Really...gee...video capture, cd-rom access (as that's what DOS dweebs usually 
think that multi-media means.), audio support.  I can play quicktime movies 
under X more reliably than under Windoze.

>11. Support for ISDN is not generally available.

Don't know...don't care.

>12. There is no disk-compression.

So...call Stacker.  Or go back to DOS, or buy a new hard drive.  Actually, 
there is code (on sunsite) for either a compressed filesystem, or one that 
runs almost everything through a built-in-gzip.  It may not be called 
DoubleSpace, but it does exist.

>Personally, I think Linux is great and I'm runnig it on one of my disks,
>but I also run MS-DOS and WfW 3.11 and OS/2 WARP2 BETA, OS/2 2.11, all
>except WARP2 in native language.

Okay...for the record:  Linux is not DOS.  If you want to do the same things 
you do under DOS, then friggin run DOS or Windows.   I'm sorry that it doesn't 
support your native language...that must be a pain for you.  At least you come 
from a county with a school system that teaches you other languages and  isn't 
so self-centric to think there is nothing else :)

>When I'm recommending some system to my customers it should be something 
>that has a proven record of durability, Netware and Lan Server both have 
>that when it comes to NOS'es. MS-DOS and OS/2 have it when it comes to
>PC OS'es.

>When it comes to TokenRing and MCA based machines, well IBM is the
>biggest player in the computer world no matter what you people of the
>.edu thinks!

You've got to be kidding me...there are still people that believe the myth of 
"You never get fired for buying IBM".   Damn...that's funny.

>What amazes me, is that there are so few from the commercial world in
>this fora, only from the academic world. Maybe I should take that as
>a sign telling me that this is of purely academic interest at the
>moment.

Oh...so because I have an .edu I must be a stuffy professor.  No.  Lets see, 
there are
        .edu sites that give outside/guest access
        .edu sites that actually have employees working for them who know what they 
                are talking about
        .edu sites that know what is current
        .edu sites that still think 1969 is current
and so on.

Please don't make sweeping generalizations.

--
Dan Newcombe                    [email-masked]
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"And the man in the mirror has sad eyes."       -Marillion

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Mark A. Davis)
Subject: Re: Licenced WordPerfect 5.1 runs only after the DEMO Version
Date: Fri, 23 Sep 1994 16:54:00 GMT

[email-masked] (Christian Kranz) writes:

>Hello,

>I have installed a licenced version of WordPerfect 5.1 for SCO-Unix.

>After starting it i get the following error message:
>> xwp

>X Error of failed request:  BadValue (integer parameter out of range for  
>operation)
>  Major opcode of failed request:  51 (X_SetFontPath)
>  Minor opcode of failed request:  0
>  Resource id in failed request:  0x4
>  Serial number of failed request:  39
>  Current serial number in output stream:  40

>If i run it after the DEMO version of WordPerfect it works fine.

>Any comments?

Make sure your Xserver sees the wordperfect fonts!  (Include the wordperfect
fonts in your Xconfig file).
-- 
  /--------------------------------------------------------------------------\
  | Mark A. Davis     | Lake Taylor Hospital | Norfolk,VA (804)-461-5001x431 |
  | Director/SysAdmin | Information Systems  |    [email-masked]       |
  \--------------------------------------------------------------------------/

------------------------------

** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **

The service address, to which questions about the list itself and requests
to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, is:

    Internet: [email-masked]

You can send mail to the entire list (and comp.os.linux.misc) via:

    Internet: [email-masked]

Linux may be obtained via one of these FTP sites:
    nic.funet.fi				pub/OS/Linux
    tsx-11.mit.edu				pub/linux
    sunsite.unc.edu				pub/Linux

End of Linux-Misc Digest
******************************